1. OVERVIEW

Tired of always starting your journey as a miner on Vectera? NG+ doesn't suit you? Roleplayers' Alternate Start is what you've been waiting for!

Inspired by classic mods like Start Me Up (Fallout 4) and Alternate Start – Live Another Life (Skyrim), this mod provides a fully dynamic alternate beginning framework designed for roleplayers, modders, and explorers alike.

Features

Skip the Vectera Intro: Begin your journey without the miner prologue. Start the main quest simply by finding the artifact out in the world (configurable). All references to Vectera in main quest dialogue have been removed. Some lines were edited or spliced.
Immersive Beginning: The custom start configuration takes place in a carefully crafted starting cell, based on the Unity end-game area, designed to feel natural and fully part of the game world.
Dynamic Integration: Automatically detects and includes mod-added locations, ships, and items in the starting options — no patches required.
Fully compatible with anything: No vanilla quests are changed — the mod relies on hooks and replacers. Vanilla starts remain fully playable, including any modifications from other mods.
Framework for Modders: Built from the ground up to be easily extended by other mod authors (documentation will come later on). Also fully open-source — see LICENSING/LEGAL for more info.

2. DETAILS

Main Quest Edits

Enjoy the main quest from a different perspective that doesn't force you to roleplay as the miner BGS wanted you to be.

There's now two ways of starting the main quest:

Going to the Argos Extractor Office in the Valberg Building (Commercial District of New Atlantis): if you accept the job you'll start the vanilla intro sequence.
Finding the Artifact Eta (the one normally found of Vectera) randomly while exploring: it will start an alternate starting sequence that skips the Vectera events.
- By default there's a 33% chance the artifact will spawn after level 5 upon reaching an eligible location. You can configure these conditions using the "Narrative Adjustments" terminal inside the starting cell. You can find the list of eligible locations in the FAQ section.
- Once the artifact is acquired, you will dispose of it in your own way and eventually Constellation will reach out to you.
- Barrett will leave to assist the Vectera Mining Operation before your arrival at the Lodge. During his recovery of Constellation's second artifact he attracted pirate attention, and the Argos miners have evidence that hostile activity is present in the area.
- After entering the Lodge, you will proceed through the standard Constellation intro with all references to you being a miner removed
- After Sarah's first quest, you will be tasked with rescuing Barrett on Vectera, again with no prior miner references.
- Completing Barrett's rescue unlocks the Frontier via a brief follow-up quest.
- The vanilla "One Small Step" quest will be entirely skipped when doing this alternate entry point in the MQ, so it will prevent events depending on it to occur, such as the SSNN interview about the Vectera events. You might want that quest to be completed for mod compatibility however: you can do it with the "Narrative Adjustments" terminal.

Those two options are obviously mutually exclusive.

Starting Options

Choose from a variety of starting scenarios:

At a major Settlement or Starstation (except quest-locked ones, like Crucible or Dazra)
At a Random POI (outpost, mine or dungeon): with custom criteria to choose what kind of planet it will be on
Shipwrecked: crash-land in the middle of nowhere and call for help using a rescue beacon (the beacon can also be used during normal gameplay!)
In your House/Dream Home/Parent's Home

Starting home

Start with any vanilla home already unlocked (except quest tied ones, like the Mercury Tower Penthouse) or even inside some mod-added ones. Currently most of DownfallNemesis' house mods are supported (see COMPATIBILITY section for a detailed list).

Narrative Adjustments

Fine-tune how your story unfolds by adding some modifiers to existing quests or applying some immersive constraints to your character. You can notably:

Customize Main Quest Starting Conditions: choose at which level and under which odds the artifact will spawn — or completely disable the Main Quest
Start with a Broken Ship: your ship will be unable to take off at start and you will have to gather basics materials to repair it

Ship Options

Pick any vanilla ship as your starting one at a custom ship technician (or even a mod-added one if you have the Ship Vendor Framework installed). You can also customize it or unlock vehicles, all free of charge.

If you don't, you will start as a pedestrian and will need to acquire a ship later on to explore space.

Gear Options

Build a custom starting loadout using a vending terminal that dynamically offers anything present in the leveled lists, including items added by other mods.

Set a budget to limit your starting gear for a more immersive experience, or use the free shopping option to assemble your perfect loadout.

Leveling Options

Skip the early-game grind and jump straight into the higher-level loops if you wish.

The ships sold by the custom technician and the gear available at the vending terminal will update automatically.

NG+ Starts

After going through the Unity, you will be prompted if you want to go through the Vanilla NG+ process or if you want to customize this new beginning.

The vanilla option will take into account whether or not you were an Argos miner in the previous universe and will adapt the Lodge intro scene accordingly
The custom option comes with extra "Narrative Adjustments":
- Argos Miner: choose to start as if you were a miner in the previous universe, even if you did the alternate MQ start (and vice-versa)
- Non-Starborn NG+: choose to remove all the starborn references & logic and play as if you never reached the Unity (it will still increase the Unity count for the next universe)

Regardless of your choices at the Narrative Adjustments terminal, you can keep the Starborn Guardian or exchange it for any other ship, including the pedestrian one. You're also free to sell the Starborn Suit to the gear terminal if you don't want it.

3. FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

In which POI can the artifact added by the mod spawn?

Here's a list:

Abandoned Mineral Refinery
NeuraDyne Botany Laboratory
Abandoned Muybridge Pharmaceuticals Lab
Forgotten Mech Graveyard
Deserted Robotics Lab
Abandoned Cryo Lab
Abandoned Maintenance Bay
Pressurized Cave
Occupied Cave
Deserted UC Listening Post
Abandoned Mine
Thermal Rise
Hillside Cave
Mineral Caverns
Cave

Does it support vanilla traits ?

Yes, indeed. There's a few things to note however :

While I made it so you can visit your parents from game start, they will only have dialogs after you join Constellation
The adoring fan will only show up after you complete the "Echoes From Vectera" quest, otherwise his dialogs wouldn't have made any sense (thanks to TwoArmedMan15 for suggesting that)
The dream home quest will trigger at the start of the game (you need to complete "One Small Step" in vanilla)

I found a mention to Constellation/Vectera in the dialogs with that NPC, can you fix it?

Yes, that's in my plans. Currently the mod only covers the first steps of MQ. All other quests/dialogs are left untouched, I'll add them later in an optional file (to ensure maximum compatibility with the base mod). Please check in the Feedback section if you find that dialog already listed before requesting.

4. KNOWN ISSUES

The ship called by the rescue beacon may clip into rocks or float slightly after landing. This is a current engine limitation; I will update if a solution is found.
No voice lines for the dialogs added to Maurice Lyon and the ship technicians.

Please let me know if you find something else.

5. COMPATIBILITY

Other alternate start mods (either free or paid) are obviously incompatible
Unity Framework by DJLegends: compatible
Revelation - Main Quest Overhaul by Gothos25 : compatible
Choose Your Variant Universe by Aurelianis: compatible
Ship Vendor Framework by rux616: support embedded in the main file. You can choose any ship added to the framework as a starting ship.
Most of DownfallNemesis' house mods have embedded support in the main file (I didn't port the quest-locked ones) :
- Earth Dome Home
- Neon Core Apartment
- Neon - The Volii Hotel - Room 42
- New Homestead House
- Paradiso Cabin
- Small Akila Player Home
- Trait Starter Homes
Take Items Through Unity - No Console Commands by Wartortle: needs compatibility patch, find it in my Creations.
POI Variations - No More Duplicates by PlatinumPoster: compatible, but will limit the possible locations for artifact spawn. Find a list in my Discord server.

6. RECOMMENDED MODS

Not Yet Shattered Space by paulbrock
The Trackers Alliance Delayed Start by strangeWindmill
Nova Transit System by LySoftDev — Especially useful for pedestrian starts
DownfallNemesis' house mods

7. LICENSING/LEGAL

If you want to modify and/or redistribute this mod, I would like to be contacted first please. Note that it is under GPL3 licensing, thus you have the obligation to make any modification done to the original source code available somewhere publicly.

You can find the source code here : https://github.com/ZeCroque/RoleplayersAlternateStart